Here I am... just sitting blankly and was staring at my laptop monitor thinking which news site to search for news... Its all and the same news everywhere... Then decided to write something on blog which will be something new for me to do.. you might be wondering that even after writing 20 posts why I am saying its something new, its because those 20 posts are post-event ie after some event happened then I wrote about my experience and now here i am writing blankly...
Its surely a tough job to write without knowing what you want to write...
From the time (some 4 weeks back) I came to know that I will be travelling back its mixed feeling going inside me.. not sure what are those.. Are they the sadness of me leaving my almost set life here in Detroit or is ot more of happiness of going back to India where I will have to set up everything back again.
In my initial years on planet earth, I was scared of setting up life somewhere else, somewhere other than Bhopal. For me Bhopal was everything and still today it remains the same. Though there is no Grand Canyon in Bhopal but there are those beautiful hills, there is no Niagara falls but then there is bada talaab, there are no big malls but there is new market and old markets of chowk, ibrahimpura and jumerati. There are no skyscrappers but there is the magnificient Taj-ul-Masjid (Asia's biggest mosque), there is no super-bowl but there are those kids playing on streets. There are no Red Lobsters, Olive garden's, Coldstone etc but there are those chai ki gumthis, those small shops making best of the chicken dishes which beat the best hotel chef's dishes. Well wow, I have almost finished on things which I liked here but there are things which still remain and which I like about Bhopal.
Hearing the Azan from Fajr to Isha, time during the festivals specially Eid when you see sea of humanity converging to Idgah for prayers, time after that when there is Ijtima (congregation of scholors) where on dua day around 5-6 lakhs people (including people of other religions) make dua. Most important is the way how you can use jugaad to get anything done, which I miss a lot here in US. Surely I love Bhopal and Bhopali's more than any other place on this earth. "Are khaan miyaan tum kya baat kar riye ho."
Oops I forgot, what I was sayiing is that I used to be scared of going out of Bhopal. I still remember when I was in Calcutta for IIM-C interview, the day interview was over I was on my way back even though IIM-C had made for our staying arrangements for some more days, or when I travelled back from Bhubaneshwar without confirmed ticket on overloaded train after a job interview. That time it was so difficult for me to stay in an unknow place. But now here I am on the opposite side of globe. Shifting between Mangalore, Chicago and Detroit which have become my other homes apart from Bhopal.
Why do people seach for something better in other places when they could find something good at same place. I can drive a BMW in US and not in Bhopal (or India) but I can definantely drive my bike at crazy speed doging the traffic back in Bhopal (or India) but not in US. For me happiness lies in both driving BMW or my bike, but I can't do that both together.
Only issue to me staying in US is that making social contacts and relationships is so more difficult. For me in Chicago and Detroit there were tens of friends, in Bhopal I had hundreds (now probabaly its very few) and back in Mangalore its in few hundreds - (yeh from the strength of 2000 odd people working in MInfy there would be hundreds of friends)...
Wow after writing all this I realise that I am very happy about thinking of going back then the issue of setting up. I am comingggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg.....
